Stephanie Deutsch

I enjoy sharing this story with students and with book groups. I also love to visit Rosenwald schools and speak with alumni. Please feel free to contact me to schedule a visit.

A bright, quick-paced work that artfully combines social and economic history, Jewish history, African American history, and moral education, You Need a Schoolhouse illuminates powerful trends in twentieth century American life.

A moving, inspirational story about an important link in the historical chain that led to the civil-rights movement and a new, more truly democratic chapter in American history.

— Kirkus Reviews

The story of Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington is a tribute to two very special men. What they were able to accomplish together with their schools is an extraordinary monument to what a collaboration based on commitment, brains, and resources can do. Stephanie Deutsch has told the tale with page-turning detail and context.

— Jim Lehrer, PBS NewsHour

Fascinating . . . In telling the story of the schools that Rosenwald and Washington created, Deutsch includes poignant vignettes about some future black leaders (such as Representative John Lewis) who received their earliest education in them.

— Weekly Standard

Many Americans know the up-from-poverty story of Booker T. Washington but few know the story of Sears president and millionaire Julius Rosenwald. Fewer still know of the friendship between these two men and how it led to the education of thousands of black students across the South. This is a moving story of black-Jewish cooperation at teh turn of the twentieth century, when prospects for interracial relations seemed dim. You Need a Schoolhouse is an inspiring read.

— Julian Bond, NAACP Chairman Emeritus

Without agreeing with every Washington pronouncement and every [Booker T.] Washington action, Deutsch portrays him as the courageous, remarkable person he was.

— Chicago Sun-Times

As it turns out, the most successful and the most fully inhabited character in the book is the wooden Rosenwald schoolhouse. The ups and downs of the campaign to get it off the ground push the narrative forward, as does the nation’s belated recognition of its historical significance, a process that Deutsch carefully documents and applauds. 